The Bay Area Country Dance Society Website

BACDS Fall Ball
"A Night at the Opera"

November 17, 2007

Kalia Kliban has been part of the Bay Area dance community since the mid-80s, performing and teaching morris, longsword, American clog, English clog, and English country dance. Her clear and humorous teaching style has gotten feet tapping at camps and gatherings in California and beyond, and she's delighted to have been chosen to lead this year's Fall Ball.  We, of course are equally excited at having her as our Prima Donna for the Opera.
 

Bonfire is a dynamic LA-area duo known for its high energy and innovative approach to traditional music.  Bonnie Insull – flute, pennywhistle and foot percussion - sparks the band with her passion for classical, traditional and improvisational music.  Richard Scher – keyboards and percussion – brings his extensive background in jazz, popular and world music to the traditional dance scene.  Bonfire normally performs with a third musician.  For the Fall Ball, it's local treasure Jon Berger

A recent transplant from New England to California, Bonnie Insull spent several decades playing classical concerts with New Hampshire’s Apple Hill Chamber Players and with the classical flute-guitar duo Native Tongues.  Her concerts took her as far as Quito, Ecuador, where she performed with the Sinfonica Nacional, and Chengdu, China, where she served as artist-in-residence in 1998. In the mid 1980’s, Bonnie co-founded Music for People with cellist David Darling, producing and giving workshops in music improvisation throughout the U.S. and Canada.   Passionate about traditional dance, Bonnie has been dancing and playing for English country dance and contra dance on both the East and West coasts for more than twenty years. 

Richard Scher, keyboardist and percussionist, has enjoyed an extensive career as a professional musician, composer and educator. He was a staff songwriter/record producer for MCA Music, Warner Chappell, Virgin Music and Island Music. As a songwriter, arranger/producer and studio musician he has worked with such artists as Diana Ross, Al Green, Kool and the Gang, Jennifer Holliday, Patti Austin, Expose, Jeff Beck, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen. As a specialist in Orff Schulwerk music education, he taught elementary school music at disadvantaged schools in Los Angeles for ten years, music education certification courses at Cal State University Los Angeles, and has conducted music education workshops around the country. Currently, he is Director of Professional Development at P.S. ARTS, a Los Angeles non-profit organization dedicated to restoring arts education to disadvantaged public schools throughout southern California.

Jon Berger has played music for morris, English country, and contra dances since 1976. A former musician for Berkeley Morris, he now plays for Apple Tree Morris in Sebastopol, and in Flashpoint, a Santa Rosa-based contra dance band. He is well-known for his powerful music, and, while playing for morris, his ability to maintain a connection between the music, the dancers and the dance (not to mention his sense of humor, and grand singing voice). He is a regular musician at Bay Area and North Bay English country dances. Jon is also a former member of Tempest, a Celtic rock band that plays for an entirely different style of dancing. Between gigs, Jon has a solo law practice. He lives in Sebastopol, California with his wife, famed morris dancer and clogger Kalia Kliban, and a sufficient number of cats.

Bill Jensen has been English country dancing since 1984 and playing piano at dances for ten years.  He particularly enjoys accompanying the teaching of dances.This is his first time performing at the Fall Ball, but we're sure it won't be his last.
 

Cathleen Myers is the Dance Director of The Great Dickens Christmas Fair, and Artistic Director of PEERS (the Period Events & Entertainment Re-Creation Society, which produces full-scale historical costume balls and dance classes almost every First Saturday). A dancer since childhood, she has researched and taught historical and vintage dance in the Bay Area since 1988. In her copious spare time, she also performs with the Alameda Vintage Dancers and with her own group, the PEERS Flying CirCUS, a historical music, dance and theater performing group, most notorious for their recurring Peerless Music Hall and Le Theatre des Vampires.